Abstract
THAT Weismann's aphorism regarding the “immortality” of the Protozoa had been uttered by others before him is not unknown; and Mr. Clifford Dobell in a recent paper ascribes to Ehrenberg the first expression of the idea. Ehrenberg's book was published in 1838; but Coleridge had said the same thing many years before in his “Biographia Literaria”, published in 1817 and written a couple of years earlier. In a footnote to chap. iv. (on Wordsworth's “Lyrical Ballads”) he says: “There is a sort of minim immortal among the animalcula infusoria, which has not naturally either birth or death, absolute beginning or absolute end: for at a certain period a small point appears on its back, which deepens and lengthens till the creature divides into two, and the same process re-commences in each of the halves now become integral.” No statement of the case could well be plainer or more precise than this. I wonder whether Coleridge was indeed the first to make it; or whether some one of the eighteenth-century naturalists had already drawn the inference—not, after all, a very profound one—that a creature which multiplies by simple fission “has not naturally either birth or death,” and may be called “immortal.”
Similar content being viewed by others
Article PDF
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
THOMPSON, D. S. T. Coleridge and the Immortality of the Protozoa. Nature 94, 562 (1915). https://doi.org/10.1038/094562b0
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/094562b0
Comments
By submitting a comment you agree to abide by our Terms and Community Guidelines. If you find something abusive or that does not comply with our terms or guidelines please flag it as inappropriate.